Purple windows

Anyone who’s ever taken a duck boat or other guided tour of Boston probably knows about the purple windows of Beacon Hill. As the story goes, from about 1818 to 1824, a glass manufacturer in England shipped glass with too much manganese oxide. With exposure to sun, the glass turned a pale lavender color, as seen in some of the panes on this 1818 house at 39-40 Beacon Street.

The house’s owner, Nathan Appleton, a wealthy textile maker, was probably not especially pleased with the surprise color change. In response to complaints, the glass manufacturer quickly corrected the formula, so such windows today are extremely rare in Boston. By the time Appleton’s daughter Frances married poet Henry Wadsworth Longfellow at the house in 1843, though, lavender windows had become a mark of prestige in Boston.

So you can imagine the uproar in 1917 when the facade of the Back Bay house on the left seemed to turn purple. That year, an architect named J. Harleston Parker purchased 173 Commonwealth Avenue and heavily remodeled the 1879 house, including the windows. Shockingly to some, the greatest concentration of purple panes in Boston was now on relatively new Comm Ave. Several people even wrote letters to the editor of the Boston Transcript about the matter. Were the windows fake?

The lead article in the December 1919 issue of Architectural Record is dedicated to discussing 173 Commonwealth and the origin of its tinted windows. It seems Parker used his professional connections to get his hands on a stash of old glass from some early-1800s Beacon Hill houses being remodeled, and Parker retrofit his “new’’ house on Comm Ave. with the purple panes.

There are a few other houses in Boston with violet windows of dubious pedigree. This granite home at 70 Beacon Street was built in 1828 at what is today a great location overlooking the Public Garden. In the 1800s, however, the city’s sewer system emptied into the bay just down the street, and the dump wasn’t too far away, either, according to the “AIA Guide to Boston.’’

The oriel window on the second floor of 70 Beacon was added during a subsequent remodel. While the purple glass in the oriel is stunning, it surely didn’t turn that color over time like the glass up the hill.

You’ll find some panes of old lavender to the right of the front door of this house at 29A Chestnut Street on Beacon Hill. Designed by architect Charles Bulfinch, the house was once the home of actor Edwin Booth, brother of John Wilkes Booth, the infamous assassin of Abraham Lincoln.

29A Chestnut was originally built in 1800, predating the defective glass. But its facade was remodeled in 1818, which is likely when those legit, (now-)violet windows were added. If you’ve ever been to 29A Chestnut, you might have missed the purple panes, thanks to the house’s distractingly magnificent side garden, seen here in springtime.

One of the only other buildings in Boston with the authentic purple glass is the King’s Chapel Parish House and Rectory at 63-64 Beacon Street. Built in the 1820s, the structure is currently undergoing extensive renovations, which makes me a bit nervous. One false move and a beautiful piece of history could be shattered.